Free Tales From Development Hell by David Hughes Page A

because Tolkien was not a regular moviegoer, he didn’t understand the problems of dramatisation,” he told Starlog. “One of his chief criticisms of [the] treatment was that he had arranged the books in chronological order. It’s actually something that you have to do if you’re going to construct a screenplay out of what is essentially a novel.”
    Nevertheless, despite the considerable efforts of Ackerman et al to convince Tolkien that his story was in safe hands, the proposed adaptation withered on the vine, and no firm agreement was ever made. “I think it was just as well,” Ackerman admits, “because it could never have been given the grand treatment that Peter Jackson afforded it.” Ackerman did, however, manage to produce another adaptation of the book. “I edited 200 issues of Famous Monsters of Filmland,” he says, “and the man who produced those issues saw a value in Tolkien. As I recall he had me do a one-shot comic book based on it. I had already created a comic strip character called Vampirella, so he had me create a one-shot on a portion of the Tolkien stories.” There was another, more surprising consolation for Ackerman: a cameo role in Peter Jackson’s early splatter film Braindead, aka Dead Alive.
    Meanwhile, back in Europe, work was underway on an animated adaptation of Tolkien’s earlier work, The Hobbit, thanks to the foresight of producer Bill Snyder, who, in 1964, optioned the rights for a period extending to 30 June 1966, handing the task of adaptation to legendary animator Gene Deitch. “After reading the book, I caught the fever,” Deitch recalled in his autobiography How to Succeed in Animation (Don’t Let A Little Thing Like Failure Stop You!), “and intensively began working up a screenplay... The great sweep of the adventure, the fabled landscapes, and the treasure of fantasy characters, made the story a natural for animation.” Incredibly, Deitch and his writing partner, Bill Bernal, were well into the screenplay when they heard, for the first time, of the existence of The Lord of the Rings. “Having assumed there was only The Hobbit to contend with, and following Snyder’s wish, we had taken some liberties with the story that a few years later would be grounds for burning at the stake,” Deitch admitted. These changes included changing some of the characters’ names, playing fast and loose with the plot — even creating a love interest, a Princess, no less — for Bilbo Baggins. Having read The Lord of the Rings, Deitch and Bernal realised that they were dealing with something “far more magnificent” than The Hobbit, and set about retro-fitting elements from the later works into their script, to allow for a potential sequel. They even conceived a ground-breaking animation method they christened‘ImagiMation’, which would combine cel-animated figures over elaborate 3D model backgrounds, in the style of some techniques pioneered by animation genius Max Fleischer.
    In January 1966, Deitch was invited to America to make a presentation to 20th Century Fox. “By the time we arrived, however, Snyder had already blown the deal by asking [Fox] for too much money.” Evidently, word of The Lord of the Rings’ groundswell of success had not reached the ears of Fox executives. By the time they did, Snyder found himself with an ace in the hole: according to the paperwork for the film rights to The Hobbit, all Snyder had to do in order to hold an option, also covering The Lord of the Rings, was produce “a full-colour motion picture version” of The Hobbit by 30 June 1966. Nowhere in the contract did it state that the film must be animated, or feature length, or even produced to a high standard. As a mortified Deitch explained, “All he had to do was to order me to destroy my own screenplay — all my previous year’s work — hoke up a super-condensed scenario on the order of a movie preview (but still tell the entire basic story from beginning to end), and all within